THE MISSING WORDS

By Jim Beers
Today's newspaper has a half-page environmental fairy tale that is a real tearjerker. Below the picture captioned "A large bull moose peers over the swamp grass, etc., etc." is an article titled, "Warmer weather imperils moose".
We are informed that of the 250,000 moose in the 7 states mentioned, all are doing well except for Minnesota moose that have declined from 12,000 to 7600 since "the 1980's". A parade of "scientists" and "experts" note the following:
- The 110,00 moose in Ontario are causing "concerns similar to those of their U.S. counterparts."
- A moose expert says the Minnesota moose "population is declining". Duh?
- "Researchers said they weren't sure why", but "more study is needed".
- An "Advisory Committee called on the state to do more to preserve and develop moose habitat".
- The same committee "warned last month that climate change threatens moose in Minnesota" despite an observation by its Chairman (a "moose researcher from Michigan Technical University") that "colder weather during the past two years has been good for northern Minnesota moose but the population hasn't measurably improved".
- The august Chairman is billed as someone familiar with the "uneasy relationship between moose and wolves in Michigan's Isle Royal National Park" where the moose population is as low as it has ever been in 50 years and "the shrinking food source provided by the moose threatens the Isle Royal Wolves.
- Finally, a pilot who has been taking tourists out to spot moose for 26 years has dropped his offer of a free flight "if they failed to spot a moose" because "it became too risky."
Biology, Politics, Government Funding, and Big Government are all intertwined in this crude propaganda piece:
Biology - How can moose in the other 6 states have increasing, stable, or populations held in check by hunting, yet Minnesota's decline is threatened by "climate change"? Answer: "Climate change" is a bogus excuse. Moose need browse that is encouraged by forest plant succession. The fact that a large portion of Northern Minnesota moose range is a National Park where forest plants cannot be disturbed by anything other than fire certainly has a lot to do with maturing forests that have less browse species like aspens, birch, Balsam, and willows. Add to that a National Forest that is less and less prone to "disturb" forest succession by logging and maintaining roads and you have a deficit of food, particularly winter food for moose.
Then you have predation. The fact that there are no wolf packs in Maine (60,000 moose) or New Hampshire (4,600 moose "held at that level by hunting") or Vermont (4,000 moose "kept stable through hunting") is significant. Although there are newly introduced wolf packs currently coexisting with 15,000 moose in Idaho ("stable and expanding their range") and 7,700 moose in Wyoming: those wolves are currently decimating the elk and deer populations as they also kill sheep and cattle to increase their numbers. The wolves are killing moose mostly in the winter and as they give birth but not yet in the intensity the wolves have shown elk, deer and livestock that are generally easier to kill. The 150,000 moose in Alaska have their healthy numbers thanks largely to politicians with guts like Governor Palin that ordered aerial gunning to thin wolf numbers to prevent a decrease in moose numbers. Governor Palin was right and frankly is a better biologist than these Minnesota moose "experts" whining in their beer. Oh, one more thing. This decline "since the 1980's": wasn't that shortly after the wolves were given complete federal protection? Wasn't this when trapping and shooting of wolves was prohibited. Wasn't this when the federal government "took over wolves" and states like Minnesota became grant supplicants and "gofers" (no, not gophers as in the U of M) for federal regulators and grant-dispensers? Nah, there couldn't be any relationship there, just coincidence.
Politics - What Minnesota politician would dare to ask why wolf control is not necessary to slow or stop a decline in Moose? What Minnesota politician would dare to call this "climate change" excuse a red herring? What Minnesota politician would stand up to the National Park Service or the US Forest Service and get them to start managing and allowing "public use" of the MINNESOTA renewable natural resources like timber and wildlife that are increasingly declining and going unmanaged as forest fire threats and forest fire fighting become ever greater problems for Minnesotans? US Senator Klobuchar? US Senator Franken? A Governor preparing to run for President? A state legislature and DNR that have grown the most complex hunting and fishing regulations I have encountered in a lifetime of studying hunting and fishing regulations? None of the above would say a thing just like no one will admit to the need to reduce predation by other overpopulated predators like seals and whales that are suppressing already stressed commercial marine fisheries. While the politicians all shake their heads and surely are "willing to do something" for the moose, anything beyond attending meetings and shoveling tax money to state agencies and a bevy of "experts" and "scientists" is (as another great leader recently observed about when life begins) "above" their pay grade.
Government Funding - Is there anyone that doesn't get the connection between "scientists" that call "for more study" for some emotional critter (on which they are "expert") and who will get government funding for said critter. Consider all those butterfly experts and bat scientists and sucker researchers that informed us of the endangered plight of some critter. Who got the subsequent "grants"? Who got the tenure and the assistants and a long string of studies and testimony requests all paid for by you and me? These guys says moose are declining due to climate change although cool years show no positive response. Even though they admit that its' "not clear what they're dying from", they ignore the one big moose killer (wolves) as though it does not exist. Wolf control gives absolute results in a short time; climate change and "pathogens" are never measurable, never-ending sinkhole for government funding and unaccountable career enhancement.
Big Government - As the President departs for Copenhagen to "get the Olympics for Chicago" we are wondering what he and his minions will say about "climate change" and "cap and trade" in December in Copenhagen if he doesn't "get the Olympics". If he sticks to his script "global warming", excuse me "climate change", will be front and center. The proposed "cap and trade" nonsense proposed at home will destroy businesses further and raise taxes precipitously and an international agreement will put the US under yet another Constitution-destroying international Treaty: but not to worry since there will be money flowing from it for things like "the declining moose of Minnesota". So this propaganda piece is yet another building block in the suffocating big government that no one wants but that will provide each of us (we think) with that certain something none of us can do for ourselves.
Oh, the "Missing Words":
HOW MANY moose (or wolves) are "ENOUGH"? Why isn't the fact that there are 150,000 moose thriving in Alaska "enough"? Where is it written that moose or wolves or bears must be EVERYWHERE"?
FOREST MANAGEMENT of Northern Minnesota National Parks and National Forests is absolutely vital to stabilizing and /or increasing moose food supply, particularly in the winter.
PREDATOR CONTROL works in Alaska to stabilize moose. Why is it not even mentioned in Minnesota?
There was NEVER A PERIOD IN HUMAN HISTORY WHEN ANY ANIMAL POPULATION WAS STABLE. WHY MUST MOOSE POPULATIONS BE STABLE NOW?
If Minnesota moose are being decreased by "climate change" WHY ARE THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND THE STATE OF COLORADO STILL TRYING TO ESTABLISH LYNX IN COLORADO? Colorado has always (in known history) been the absolute southern extent of Canada lynx habitat as Minnesota is today for moose. Lynx have come and gone from Colorado for eons. If the world is "warming" how can we continue to introduce a northern species like lynx into habitat we are told is becoming tropical and therefore more appropriate to jaguars and iguanas? Maybe that is why the lynx are found starving to death in Nebraska and New Mexico. The reason "climate change" is not mentioned in the lynx "Recovery" scam is because the lynx introduction is for the purposes of pleasing the rich elites and for stopping ski resorts and roads etc., etc. If "climate change" (i.e. "warming") had anything to do with the critters as occasionally charged regarding critters like lynx and wolverines at the southern extremes of their habitat and federally endangered like wolves and grizzly bears (therefore never in sufficient numbers and subject to being placed anywhere under complete and eternal federal protection) would no more be able to live in the lower 48 than polar bears or ptarmigan but hey, mox nix.
In a nation that is permitting the shredding of the best Constitutional government ever conceived by man, what's wrong with believing in fairy tales as your house burns down around you?

Jim Beers 9/30/09

WHEN DOCUMENTS COME TO LIFE

By Jim Beers
"It's Alive! It's Alive!"
Dr. Frankenstein, when the Monster (Boris Karloff) begins to stir in the 1931 horror film - Frankenstein.
I recently distributed an article (Crime), wherein I made the case for firing and prosecuting federal and state employees that engage in "infringing" on the Constitutional Right "to keep and bear Arms" while they are at work, being paid out of public funds. I similarly argued for the prosecution of state and federal politicians that initiate, fund, or otherwise maintain gun restrictions that "infringe" on the Constitutional Right "to keep and bear arms" while acting in their official capacity and are being paid out of public funds.
My thesis was that unless and until the US Congress calls a Constitutional Convention and the 2nd Amendment is changed or eliminated, politicians and public employees on official duty and in their official capacity must honor and uphold (they used to swear to do this) The Constitution of the United States or face prosecution as a lawbreaker (of the Supreme Law of the Land) and dismissal. The two examples I used were the National Park Service (a hotbed of anti-gun sentiments for decades) and the government of the District of Columbia (another hotbed of governmental officials that, like New York, Chicago, et al blames everything from crime to unemployment and low test scores on guns).
As a result of this proposition I have just been called a "screaming idiot" and "just a bitter ex-federal employee". This articulate argument has changed my mind! Who could help but be swayed by such eloquence?
Additionally, I am in desperate need of public approval. Years ago when I wrote about how dog owners and hunters, trappers, fishermen, ranchers, and farmers all had a stake in the public witch hunt being conducted by HSUS, PETA, et al on cockfighting I found out just how much see themselves in the unjust plight of others. I said that the people OWN those chickens and you are free to go or not go. I said local jurisdictions should have the say about where, when, how, and if cockfighting was to be conducted. I cautioned about letting it become a state or federal issue because power politics would impose the will of whoever pays the politicians the most. That said, I still believe that if and how cockfights by chickens privately owned are eliminated will be the model for everything from banning the use of doge for hunting to raising turkeys and "owning" pets.
Well to make a long story short I was verbally bitten (he was surely rabid) by a famous vet and as a result, most dog owners found me to be verboten in polite company. Could I bear up if this happened again? What if federal employees didn't like me anymore? What if politicians that "run" DC or New York or Chicago (or even The White House) didn't like me? It is too much to bear. I give up: I will even sing (to the President Barack Obama school hymn, formerly known as The Battle Hymn of the Republic) "The Constitution is Alive! It's Alive and I believe, I believe" to prove that I no longer think of the document as a cornerstone but as a golden retriever in love with whoever comes through the door and will feed it.
So The Constitution is no longer relevant as judges from Ruth Bader Ginsburg to Harry A. Blackmun have been telling us for years. The law is what they say it is and that has hardly anything to do with the constitution (the lack of capital t & c fits their concept in this regard. Therefore we are free to do whatever we can.
If the 2nd Amendment doesn't "really" mean that the right to bear Arms can't be infringed so therefore it is alright and even admirable for government employees and politicians and appointees like Attorney General Holder and a host of White House (staff?, Czars?, workers?, commissars?, what?) to "infringe" gun ownership the mind boggles at the implications:
- It would obviously be admirable for some racist appointee or bureaucrat or politician to work on manuals about how to deny certain minority citizen groups government services or public facilities or grants or contracts or whatever. What, you say the 15th Amendment prohibits that? You say there are laws against that? Well all those laws are based on that Amendment and hey, just like the 2nd Amendment, those are just words. Hey man, we won this election and now our guy is in power. Suck it up soldier!
- It would also be admirable for some anti-female liberation appointee or bureaucrat or politician to develop ways and places that women could be denied the vote in order to get more anti-womans' lib politicians elected. What's that you say? The 19th Amendment prohibits that. Well big deal. A lot of us think that female voters disrupt democracy so now that we're in power and "our" Attorney General is going to work with certain powerful city and state governments to get female voting to be by permit only. You will have to see a Voting Chief for a female voting permit but really, we don't see where very many females will qualify. This is called the Sullivan Gun Control Law model and it worked fine for guns and we can get around the 19th Amendment and all those silly laws it authorized just like we got aroung the 2nd Amendment thanks to legal trailblazers in the National Park Service and model city governments like the District of Columbia.
- All you folks that got all worked up about the Acorn "ladies" giving advice about tax evasion, cool down. Taxes aren't paid by everyone, take the Secretary of the Treasury and the Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. Those Acorn ladies and the likes of Geithner and Rangel all understand this "living document" stuff. Sure the 16th Amendment says that the government can collect income taxes but hey man, it doesn't say "everyone" anywhere in that Amendment. The bureaucrats that turned the other way, the fellow politicians that slap those bums on the back and particularly state governments like Maryland that intend to prosecute the man and woman that videotaped the Acorn ladies all understand the nature of a "living" constitution. May they all get big bonuses, big promotions, and big retirements!
It would be admirable if some bureaucrat with time on his or her hands could manualize the Constitutional rights that have already been whittled down or eliminated and how it happened. Then some other poor federal schlub looking for work could make up a flow chart of what is left to be done and how to do it. For instance:
- The Endangered Species Act has already gutted the 5th Amendment protections for private property. What international treaties can be signed to give government control of all private property? What legislation about water or wetlands or animal "welfare" could be passed that would just make the entire 5th Amendment a laughing stock?
- The 1st Amendment wording about religion and speech and the press and assembly are already a joke. Congress and the White House openly joke about Tea Party dufuses and those Congressional Recess meetings were stacked with reactionaries so they can be dismissed and either tightly controlled or eliminated in the future. The words about religion should be sent to our new Islamic allies to see what they could suggest for a better way to "manage" religion. Freedom of speech and the press are already "shaped charges" no longer meant to protect those things: the "living document" approach is to use these as tools to destroy the political opposition of those in power so that their power is maintained.
- The 10th Amendment says all "powers not delegated to the United States, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." What a joke! The "United States" has the power and duty to protect the right to bear Arms - so how do New York City and Chicago get the "power" to "infringe" this right? For that matter how does New Jersey or Wisconsin or Massachusetts get the "power" to "infringe" the right of residents and visitors "to keep and bear Arms"? Hey they get it just like the Supreme Court got the power to authorize the slaughter of millions of unborn children and soon the euthanizing of millions of old and disabled adults - they do it the old-fashioned way, they just invent it out of thin air and dare anyone to disagree.
Wow! If only I was still a federal employee I could come up with a new office, (heck why not a Division, why not an agency, why not a Department?) of Constitutional Surgery. This "whatever" could document all the Orwellian wordsmithing to date. We could fill computers with flow charts about what needs to be done for any current Administration and Congress (may Columbia be praised, the source of all bonuses and promotions) to "have their way with the constitution" just like some sailor in Olangapo or St. Pauli. We could get money and personnel for gun bans or minority-free organizations or places where women were barred from voting. We could hire Immams as 1st Amendment consultants and we could have offices of animal welfare and environment to coordinate us with the UN and international radical groups to sponsor treaties (to supercede The Constitution) and to stir up urban elites to gain passage of new draconian laws that undermine The Constitution before anyone figures out what is going on.
This "living document" stuff is a bureaucrat and politician's dream and a citizen's succuba.
So there you have it! I must count myself as the latest convert from a respecter of the US Constitution to a "living document" acolyte that sees The Constitution as both an impediment to great men like our President and the like of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reed but a money bonanza to smart, conniving bureaucrats. The world this creates is not fit for most of you but I hope to be one of those standing after the rest of you lose your rights. Oh, didn't I tell you? I plan to be like those two great New Yorkers Rangel and Schumer. Rangel doesn't pay taxes and neither will I. Schumer is a big gun-control pol that has had one of the few gun permits issued in New York, he is my model for keeping my gun.
Therefore I apologize to all those National Park Service gun control stalwarts working on the gun ban in National Parks. I further apologize to all those DC politicians and police that looked the other way when my old Senator Webb carried his loaded handgun through the District from the airport and plopped it on a Congressional X-Ray machine where its discovery was judged "insufficient evidence" by Congressional Police and DC was never even heard from. Had that been a peasant such as me; a felony conviction, a fine and jail time would have been followed up by denial of any future gun ownership or use like hunting and a denial of voting rights as well.
PS You can see from this last why I am a "convert", I am too old to be taking showers with all the scalawags, bureaucrats, politicians, and ne'er do wells that belong in prisons for destroying our Constitution while collecting government paychecks!

Jim Beers
26 September 2009

CRIME

By Jim Beers

crime (krim) n. serious violation of human law.
Even a poor non-lawyer like me understands that all US laws are based on and authorized (or else they are Un-Constitutional) by The Constitution of the United States. Theoretically (according to some) The Constitution is a "living document" that "evolves" as out tastes and the fortunes of politicians dictate: other folks like yours truly believe that The Constitution is a firm document that spells out what is and what is not "legal".
Modifications of The Constitution are provided for in Article.V. where it states that Congress may call a Constitutional Convention and propose Amendments. The history of Amendments is checkered to say the least. Remember Prohibition and all the violence and corruption it bred? Did anyone know or admit to the impact of the authorization of a federal income tax that was intended only for millionaires? Was there any awareness of what it meant to change the way US Senators were chosen from appointment by State Legislatures to a popular vote? Nevertheless, The Constitution is what it is and if not honored will ultimately lead to anarchy, chaos, and the rule of the most ruthless among us.
If someone violates a law, he or she violates The Constitution since, as previously noted, The Constitution is the basis and authority for the legitimacy of any law. With this in mind, let's consider two of the many Un-Constitutional practices that have arisen in recent years due to citizen apathy, the unlikelihood of prevailing in open argument in a Constitutional Convention, and the disregard for Constitutional wording rampant today among politicians, judges, bureaucrats, and radical groups seeking radical change.
GUNS
The 2nd Amendment to The Constitution of the United States says, "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."
Question: If the "right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed" how can anyone "infringe" my "right to keep and bear arms"?
Cities like New York (1911) and Chicago (1982) infringed the right of all Americans to "keep and bear arms under the banner of "disarming" gangsters and their gangs. States like Wisconsin, New Jersey, and Massachusetts "infringe" this right under an unmentioned Constitutional right (like the notorious "right to privacy" that was invented to authorize taking the life of unborn children) of State Legislators and Governors to do as they want in "their" State.
Because of these precedents that have been tolerated by those scalawags mentioned in the last sentence of paragraph 3, those that would eliminate the 2nd Amendment without the bothersome and likely unsuccessful process of arguing for it in a Constitutional Convention are emboldened. It seems entirely likely, to them today, that simply electing sympathetic politicians and obtaining appointments of sympathetic judges however that is done (i.e. giving money and election help of many forms). That this Constitutionally repugnant process goes forward is unmentioned by non-gun owners that fail to understand that if the 2nd Amendment is susceptible to such lawlessness, it is only a matter of time until every other Amendment is destroyed similarly by determined foes of the rights mentioned in those Amendments.
Let us consider one other aspect of this issue that seems to be ignored by all participants. How can it be "legal" for politicians and bureaucrats WHILE ON THE PUBLIC PAYROLL to advocate infringing on "the right to keep and bear Arms"? How can National Park Service employees design, lobby for, and enforce infringement of 2nd Amendment rights? How can the Mayor and City Council of the District of Columbia design, establish and enforce a gun ban that clearly infringes 2nd Amendment rights? Don't all these people collect salaries and retirements paid for by all citizens? Since these people are violating The Constitution are they not criminals (i.e. one who commits a crime)?
Is it not an additional violation of law to collect a salary while working to undermine your employer? It is like working for a salary from an oil company while spending your working hours trying to ban all uses of oil: public employees (politicians and bureaucrats) used to be sworn "to uphold the Constitution of the United States. Just as a rogue oil company employee would be fired and forced to return the illegally acquired salary, isn't a public employee (whether elected or hired) obligated to comply with The Constitution while on the public payroll? If National Park Service employees want to advocate 2nd Amendment infringement, let them quit and work to have their elected Representatives call for a Constitutional Convention. If an elected official doesn't like anything about the Constitution let him work to call a Constitutional Convention. Absent an Amendment resulting from a Constitutional Convention such government (State and federal) employees should not be hired or if hired should be fired. Those that have or are advocating or implementing infringement of 2nd Amendment rights should be fired and any salaries paid them while they did so should be returned. Infringing 2nd Amendment rights should be treated no different than infringing other Constitutional freedoms from freedom of speech and freedom of religion to freedom from discrimination to the right of females to vote. To infringe on any of these rights is a crime, to infringe on these rights while being paid to uphold The Constitution is an additional crime as well as an abomination.
PROPERTY
The 5th Amendment to The Constitution of the United States concludes with these words, "nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."
Questions: Is it "public use" for the federal government to own, ease, lease, or otherwise control or acquire control over private property that is subsequently closed to "public use"? Is private property "taken" only when purchased or does "taking" begin with and include any overt move by the federal government to initiate a process that will inevitably lead to direct acquisition or easement or control of all or parts of private property?
The federal government has been acquiring land for National Parks since 1916, for the US Forest Service since 1905, and for the National Wildlife Refuge System since 1903. Granting the tenuous but arguable point that a National Park that preserves and interprets a national historic site or that a National Forest that manages a large forest for public benefit or that a National Wildlife Refuge that manages a habitat that is significant for species of National Concern are all legitimate examples of land legitimately "taken for public use": how can any government employee or agency or Administration justify any restriction on "public use" other than use that might harm the resource for which the land was "taken"? The answer is of course there is NO legal justification for such restrictions on non-harmful public uses. For example, Wilderness Declarations; Road Closures; Area Closures; unmanaged and dwindling fish and wildlife resources; logging bans; grazing lease revocations; Gun Bans (prosecute illegal gun uses just as illegal automobile uses or any other illegal behavior should be prosecuted); expensive permits and entry fees, and needlessly complex rules and regulations that intimidate the majority of citizens are all examples of "private property taken for public use" where legitimate and beneficial "public use" is denied. If these legitimate public uses are forbidden shouldn't the property be returned to the public? Shouldn't any public employees, public agencies, or elected politicians (all of whom collect publicly funded salaries) that plan, initiate, or maintain such denials of legitimate public use be prosecuted for violating this Constitutionally authorized reason for such public land acquisition - public use under the 5th Amendment.*
*(Section 8 gives Congress "Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards and other needful buildings".)
Any questioning of federal land acquisition and closure is not complete without consideration of the latest "innovations" being used to justify more acquisition, closures and private property control.
First there is the scandalous secrecy and use of federal funds for land acquisition and closure based on "sightings" of a bird no one has seen in 60 years; the Ivory-billed Woodpecker. Secret appropriations, a "search that began in Arkansas but soon spread from Louisiana to North Carolina based on nothing but the claims of those that benefit from this fairy tale exposes a Congress of no worth and bureaucrats with no veracity. With absolutely no verification of the existence of this bird that has been extinct for 60 years; land was bought, land was eased, logging uses of private property threatened, hunting was threatened; surrogates for federal officials like The Nature Conservancy and Cornell University grant recipients wandered far and wide designating lands to be acquired and timber management that "had to be restricted" (without compensation) as has been done for decades on behalf of the red-cockaded woodpecker. The mania frenzy that is whipped up by such specious claims about species needs by "scientists" has come to be a tool to override any public input or reasonable public debate about such acquisitions or such use of public funds.
Second there is the biggest use of subterfuge for government acquisition since the Trojan Horse. US Representatives and Senators, leery of growing local resentments about planned government land acquisition and control but anxious to get money and support from national groups clamoring for more and more, never-ending government control of real private property have come up with a giant scam of questionable legality. I am referring here to Congressional "Heritage Area" Designations with attendant funding given to land control advocates. I saw this in Virginia (an 8-County Historic Heritage Area) and it is now being perpetrated in North Dakota (an 800 sq. mi.; 5-County Heritage Area).
Is it "public use" to give federal public funds to a non-public, non-profit Foundation to "Increase recognition of unique resources", or to "Develop a strong sense of place", or to identify "New opportunities for funding and partnerships", or to develop "Sustainable place-based economic development", or to attain "Balanced preservation and promotion"? Of course not!
Just as in Virginia, the non-public, non-profit is a surrogate and silent partner for the National Park Service, US Fish and Wildlife Service, The Nature Conservancy, and a hodgepodge of historic and environmental extremists that want control of all the private property they can possibly get. The federal funding allow this gaggle of radicals to alternately cajole and intimidate local governments and rural communities. Road projects will be stopped, sewage improvements given even more expensive requirements, land uses will be subjected to more and more controls, and rural living will be more and more difficult as certain parcels are targeted for acquisition, others are targeted for easements and teams of feds and radicals and TNC operatives treat local landowners to the "good-cop/bad cop" treatment regarding acquiring or easing parcels or using their own property productively.
"Heritage Areas" are a government land acquisition process begun as something else to counter public objections and to foster public secrecy that is anathema to a Constitutional Republic. Defining when the acquisition process begins is long overdue to avoid such subterfuges in the future.
When the dust settles remaining parcels and communities will be less productive and then acquisition and land control easements will be "taken" as cheaply and easily as a hungry northern pike grabbing a cheap Chinese spoon trolled behind an outboard.
Questions about land acquisition legitimacy and when the land acquisition process begins must be asked and answered before the real citizen protector - The Constitution of the United States - can be invoked. Like public criminals (both politicians and bureaucrats) destroying selected portions of The Bill of Rights while on the public payroll, public criminals closing public lands to public use, acquiring lands for public use knowing no use will be allowed, and/or engaging in land acquisition subterfuges like Heritage Areas should be prosecuted for violating The Constitution. Unless and until we regain control of these federal politicians and federal bureaucrats THAT WE PAY TO WORK FOR US UNDER CONSTITUTIONAL REQUIREMENTS we will continue to lose our Rights, our Public Property, and our Private Property. Those that would destroy our rights and freedoms are powerless if they are denied these rogue politicians and self-serving bureaucrats. The Constitution of the United States has and will once again preserve Liberty if only we can reinforce and protect it as we should have been doing all along for the past 100 years.

Jim Beers
25 September 2009